


Mycroft's Monkeys

by Tammany



Category: Sherlock - Fandom
Genre: Fluff, Gen, M/M, Mystrade fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-30
Updated: 2014-08-30
Packaged: 2018-02-15 08:46:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,439
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2222826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tammany/pseuds/Tammany
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ok, this is really just fluff written to compensate people for having managed to reduce them to tears over the "sad" last story. This is light, fluffy, with limited value beyond romance and domestic bliss. Lestrade takes up a new hobby, and talks Mycroft out of an old one. Happiness ensues in a glorious lemon-tea fog.</p><p>Really. Just fun. And a bit of melancholy yearning for the days when I drank my tea with sugar and lemon and watched it glow like cherry amber in the sunshine....</p><p>Tomorrow I hope to work on *Time and Memory.* Tonight, I did this so y'all can stop using up the international reserve of hankies....</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mycroft's Monkeys

Mycroft worried. Constantly.

Greg, conversely, did not. Mycroft admired that attribute: Greg was a proven master at determining what he could do, what he could not, doing the first—and refusing to fret over the rest for the most part. All right, catch him in mid-struggle, for example that vile battle of wits between Sherlock and Moriarty with the civilians of London as vulnerable markers in the game…well, Lestrade could get remarkably damned focused and stressy. But it wasn’t worry—it was immediate, and it was applied to solving every last damned problem Lestrade could find that was “his division.”

What wasn’t his division just plain wasn’t. What had not happened and was out of his control, he didn’t tie himself into knots over.

“Got enough things to deal with that I actually can handle,” he’d say, leaning back in his chair and sipping his coffee, reading glasses perched on his nose as he read the morning news on his cell phone. “Beyond that? Not my circus, not my monkeys.”

He loved that phrase, and recommended it to Mycroft regularly. “Say it, Mike. One word at a time, no matter how silly you feel. No, don’t make that face at me, you damned tosser. Come on, you know the litany: Not my circus, not my monkeys.”

“But it’s all my circus, and monkeys are my division,” Mycroft would whine back. The truth was he didn’t know how to stop worrying. The higher he rose, the more control he had achieved—and the larger the jobs were. The crazier the variables. Or, to put it another way—these days he was ringmaster of a circus with a million rings, crammed with thousands of primates ranging in size from the tiniest big-eyed lemur to King Kong. All of them rabid. And the audience was made up of babies and school children in knee socks and school blazers and mums about to give birth and, for that matter, darling little baby bunnies and fluffy duckies and probably Bambi, too. And Bambi’s mummy.

Yes, he thought, wearily, if he messed up he, Mycroft Holmes, would personally be responsible for the Death of Bambi’s Mummy.

Of course he worried….

And let’s not even discuss Sherlock, and his vagaries, of which drugs were actually the least classified and the easiest to rectify. Which said something horrible about Mycroft and Sherlock and the lives they were living, didn’t it?

“Don’t worry about it, Mike.” Lestrade had come over to Mycroft’s rooms on Pall Mall…a place no one else came, not even Anthea. Well—Sherlock occasionally broke in, but not often. Even Sherlock valued his life more than that…

“Don’t worry about it,” Lestrade said again, calmly wandering around the kitchen locating mugs, tea, and the electric kettle. “Sherlock will pull it off, or he won’t, and you’ve already done everything you can reliably do to help him along. It’s up to him, now.”

“You think that makes me feel any better?” Mycroft snapped, fingers working their way through his thinning hair as he tried to massage the tension out of his scalp. “He and that….that…that _soldier_? They egg each other on, you know. And to think I used to hope that Dr. Watson would bring out the best in Sherlock…”

“He does, Mike,” Lestrade said, grinning. “For the most part, anyway. They’re just a bit…well, um…”

“They’re hellions,” Mycroft grumbled. “Nightmare imps of hell. Trouble on a rampage. And it does not help that Dr. Watson is forever wrong about what’s going on. If he had a clue, and could actually manage to think through the consequences, there might be a chance he’d act as a brake on Sherlock…”

“Nnnnnnno. No, not happening,” Lestrade said, frowning as he measured out loose tea into the little mesh strainers Mycroft kept so that he could enjoy the benefits of tea by the cup without the uncivilized misery of papery, dusty, stale tea bags. “How much for a mug?”

“Heaping teaspoon is usually enough, but don’t let it steep too long,” Mycroft murmured, before returning to his lament. “And, no, Dr. Watson wouldn’t slow Sherlock down, would he? The two of them get too smug about their bad-boy selves, don’t they?”

“A-yep.” Lestrade chuckled. “Full of themselves, aren’t they?”

Mycroft could see them in his mind’s eye, and didn’t know whether to laugh, moan, or just smile fondly. “They’re children. Boys. The vanity, the insecurity, the joys and rages…even their friendship is…”

“Boyish?” Lestrade nodded, and leaned easily against the counter. “Yeah. Couple-a lads, they are. Doubt that John could have married Mary, or Sherlock accepted it, if she weren’t Wendy to Peter and his Lost Boy.”

Mycroft clucked. “You approve.”

“Don’t approve or disapprove, you daft beggar. Don’t approve of gravity or time, but I don’t fight it, either.”

“I thought he’d grow up, someday,” Mycroft said, forlornly, shaken with the burden Sherlock’s relentless juvenile recklessness placed on him. “He’s almost forty, Greg. I can trust him to kill off an entire criminal network. But I can’t trust him to…”

“Stop. You can’t trust him to stop—stop killing, stop hunting, stop looking for an adventure. Stop stuffing himself with chemicals if adventure doesn’t show up soon enough.”

“No,” Mycroft said. “I can’t. I can’t even trust him to keep it to himself. His games spread. Like that mess with Moriarty. Or…Magnussen.”

Lestrade nodded. “Yep. And someday it’s going to end.”

“Badly.”

“Probably. Unless he learns discretion. But you can’t teach him that. So—let it go.” Lestrade poured the tea water, then carried the mugs over to the table. He collected spoons, and a bowl to hold the spent tea leaves, and milk and sugar.  Then he sat opposite Mycroft. “You need a hobby, Red.”

“My hair isn’t red,” Mycroft grumbled. “Not any more. What there is left of it is auburn.”

“Which is a dark red.”

“Brown.”

“Red-brown. More red.”

“You’re baiting me.”

“Gets your mind off your worries.” Lestrade smiled, stirred the tea until the milk was well-stirred in and the sugar dissolved, then took a long pull. “Really, Red, you’ve got to let go. It’s his life, his responsibility. Not your circus…”

“But he is my monkey,” Mycroft growled, and gave in to temptation. He crossed to the counter and took a golden lemon from the fruit basket, cutting a wedge with a sharp knife. He came back to the table, added sugar and lemon, and stirred, watching the tea bleach from dark red-brown (auburn) to an orange not that far from the copper of his hair in his youth. He leaned over and drew in the sweet scent of lemon-tea, the hint of sugar. He picked up the mug and sipped, delicately. “He’s always been my monkey.”

“Poor you.”

“No,” Mycroft said. “He was…wonderful. Terrible. Beautiful. Brilliant. Envious. Worshipful.” He sipped again, closing his eyes, remembering back. “Seven years is a world of time—and never enough. It was enough to make it impossible for me not to always be ahead of him, always in authority over him, always responsible for him. And we were never alike, though it took me years to really understand that. Decades. I may be learning it even now. I didn’t know until recently that he was an extrovert…”

“He doesn’t know that,” Lestrade pointed out. He sprawled comfortably at Mycroft’s kitchen table, legs stretched out until his feet in their clunky, comfortable street-shoes grazed Mycroft’s own, elegantly shod in his best hand-crafted British cobbler-made office shoes. “He thinks he hates people.”

“He hates being unskilled with them,” Mycroft murmured, eyes still shut, brain oddly fixating on the slight pressure against the curved arch of his insole. He held the mug up, just short of his mouth, just under his long, beaky nose, breathing in the glorious perfume. It made him think of sunshine dappling through spring-green, pink-edged leaves; of daffodils blooming so early the ground they grew in was still covered with a faint crystalline crust of snow. The smell made him smile. “Sherlock chooses audiences, because by playing a role he understands, he can…win hearts. Dr. Watson’s heart. Yours. Mrs. Watson’s. Mrs. Hudson. That little lab tech, Miss Hooper…”

“He still overloads.”

“Mmmm,” Mycroft murmured. “He’s not without his own reserve and shyness. He’s just—I endure people. There are so few I am ever comfortable with, or really wish to be comfortable with.”

“You play it better.”

“I care less. It helps.” Mycroft sighed. “He wants so much… Yearns. He’s downright Byronic.”

“Mad, bad, and dangerous to know?”

“And beautiful. Never forget beautiful.” Mycroft knew his voice told of his own envy, and he forced himself to take a deep breath, open his eyes, and give Lestrade a calm, tight smile. “Age before beauty. Brains before brawn. We used to torment each other quite dreadfully.”

“Still do,” Lestrade said, with a soft, pensive little smile. “Let me get you more tea.”

“I should go in to work.”

“Take the day. I have.”

Mycroft blinked. “You have? Why?”

“Because I needed the time, and had enough to call in,” Lestrade said, cheerily. “Mental health day.”

Mycroft didn’t approve. “Tsk. Whatever happened to dedication and commitment?”

“Commitment is what will happen to me if I’m so dedicated I ignore the need to take a rest every so often.” The man stretched with near-obscene ease, his posture a lazy, comfortable nightmare. Mycroft couldn’t even determine how one managed to slouch so, in a straight-backed kitchen chair. “Going to give the day to my hobbies.”

“Football? On a weekday?”

“No,” Lestrade laughed, eyes dancing. “Monkey identification.”

Mycroft blinked. “What?”

“It’s like bird watching, only different. I work out whose monkeys are whose.”

He couldn’t help the bark of laughter that rose up. “Greg…”

He so seldom called Lestrade “Greg.”

Greg smiled at him. “Oh, come on, Mike. Be honest—you need someone to tell you which ones aren’t your monkeys.”

“That’s hardly a hobby.”

“I dunno. It’s entertaining, useful, and it keeps me occupied and off the streets. Better than woodworking or basket weaving.”

“Less fun that football or life drawing, though. Or theater. I suspect you’d very much enjoy amateur theatrics.”

“Why? Because I put up with Sherlock?”

“Because you’re a complete clown,” Mycroft snapped. “Really, you don’t need to look after me.”

Lestrade simply watched him, eyes steady, smiling, patient. Mycroft twitched, and finished his mug of tea. Before he could use that as an excuse to get up and leave for the office, Lestrade had both mugs and was refilling the empty strainers; turning on the electric kettle.

“Really, I should go in.”

“Should? Really? You’re indispensable today?”

He wasn’t.  In truth, he was seldom indispensable in the sense of being needed in his office. It was more vital he be on-call, and even then, he’d worked long and hard to develop a system in which nothing actually came to him that needed anything less than his genius oversight. His primary role was to serve as an asset, secure and in hand, available when needed, always alert and up to date.

Much of his time was spent, well…worrying. Studying. Pacing around determining where the next threat might come from, and the next, and the next.

He could do that just as well in half the time, in the comfort of his own home, and have time left over to drink hot lemon tea and banter about circuses and monkeys with Lestrade. Which was one more thing to worry about. Someday if he gave in to that temptation, he’d find himself staring another, larger temptation in the eye.

“I really shouldn’t…”

But the mugs were on the table, and this time Lestrade had cut a little saucer of lemon wedges for him—enough to suggest he was expected to stay home at least for the morning, and to drink a number of mugs of hot, fragrant, sweet tea.

“I don’t have a hobby,” Mycroft mumbled, squeezing a wedge of lemon and stirring in sugar. The sun outside was pale, but when a slim beam came in and landed in the tea it turned to burning, warm brilliance. He looked down, entranced.

“Yeah, you do,” Lestrade said, fondly.

“I do not!”

“Yeah, you _do._ Worry.” Lestrade was wiping the counter, sponging off the knife and the cutting board, hunting for plastic wrap to wrap the remains of the lemon.

Mycroft frowned at him. “I doubt you’ll let me settle down to a morning with my hobby, then,” he grumbled.

“’Cause you need a new hobby.”

Mycroft sniffed. “Oh? What?”

“Ignoring monkeys.”

“I doubt it’s possible.” A fact, though at the moment Mycroft had to admit it was a rather depressing fact.

“That’s what you think,” Lestrade said, smiling….

The silence filled the room like the sunbeam filled the mug. Everything seemed to glow.

Mycroft managed a cautious, contained breath, releasing it slowly. “You really shouldn’t flirt if you don’t mean it.” He held the mug, stilling his hands against the solid china.

Lestrade cocked his head. “I’m not.”

Mycroft frowned. “Not…? What?”

“Mmmm?”

“Not…flirting?” Mycroft blushed, wondering if he’d misread somehow.

“Oh, I’m flirting,” Lestrade said. “Just—not flirting when I don’t mean it.”

Mycroft could have sworn he could count every dust mote sliding down the sunbeam. He could have counted each beat of his heart drumming in his ears. He could have counted the sparks of light off Lestrade’s eyelashes.

“That’s not amusing,” he said, voice shaking.

“Wasn’t meant to be. At least…not the way you meant.”

Mycroft frowned. “Why now?”

Lestrade spent a moment thinking. At last he said, “Eh. I could spend the day on answers. The short one, though? Because right now—it’s what I want.”

Which was the kind of answer that brooked very little argument. Mycroft struggled, trying to find the way out of the situation—sure he must find a way out.

Lestrade chuffed, softly. “You’re about to adopt a mess of monkeys, Mike. Don’t. Just answer one question: do you want to, too?”

_Yes...._

He couldn’t say it, but it rang in his mind, clear and bright and sweet. He closed his eyes, trying to shut out a face he’d grown fond of over the years, refusing to admit it mattered to him. “I…”

“Yes or no?”

“I….”

Lestrade laughed, softly and said, “I’ll take that as a yes,” and kissed him.

Even Mycroft had to admit that the rest of the day was not spent thinking about monkeys—and the few he thought about legitimately belonged to his and Lestrade’s own private circus…and performed beautifully.


End file.
